Cherokee syllabary (ᏣᎳᎩ / Tsalagi)

The Cherokee syllabary was invented by George Guess/Gist,
a.k.a. Chief Sequoyah, of the Cherokee, and was developed between 1809 and 1824.
At first Sequoyah experimented with a writing system based on
logograms, but found this cumbersome and unsuitable for Cherokee.
He later developed a syllabary which was originally cursive and
hand-written, but it was too difficult and expensive to
produce a printed version, so he devised a new version
with symbols based on letters from the Latin alphabet
and Western numerals.

Sequoyah's descendants claim that he was the last surviving
member of his tribe's scribe clan and the Cherokee syllabary was
invented by persons unknown at a much earlier date. No archaeological
evidience has been found to verify this claim.

By 1820 thousands of Cherokees had learnt the syllabary, and by 1830,
90% were literate in their own language. Books, religious texts, almanacs
and newspapers were all published using the syllabary, which was widely
used for over 100 years.

Today the syllabary is still used; efforts are being made to revive
both the Cherokee language and the Cherokee syllabary, and Cherokee courses
are offered at a number of schools, colleges and universities.

Notable features

Type of writing system: syllabary

Direction of writing: left to right in horizontal lines

Used to write: Cherokee (ᏣᎳᎩ), a Southern Iroquoian language
spoken by around 22,500 people in North Carolina (Tetsas / ᏖᏣᏍ),
Oklahoma (Asgaya gigageyi / ᎠᏍᎦᏯ ᎩᎦᎨᏱ)
and Arkansas (ᎨᎢᏱ).

Sample text in Cherokee

Transliteration

Translation

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They
are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another
in a spirit of brotherhood. (Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)